Tuesday, April 6, 2010

Clash of the Titans

Against my better judgment, I went to see Clash of the Titans with my friend M.Giant. I knew there was going to be craploads of CGI in the film, and yet somehow he convinced me I needed to see it. I think he just wanted to see me have an aneurysm in the theater or go postal on some people. I even opted to NOT drink in the parking lot as originally planned, mostly so I would remember some of what I had seen.

For those that don’t know, it’s a remake of a film from long ago, which I grew up watching and would still watch over and over again. The original isn’t the greatest film of all time, but for a kid, it was amazing – plus, I’ll be the first to admit the Original Clash of the Titans is the only reason I passed the Mythology section of Art History in my undergrad – sad but true. Perseus is the son of Zeus. Zeus impregnated a human and her husband had them both cast into the ocean. Perseus was raised by a fisherman and then set out on his own when the fisherman was killed by one of the gods who was having a bad day.

Perseus ends up in Argos where the angry god comes and threatens the entire city with destruction unless they sacrifice their princess. They have like 10 days to decide. This gives Perseus enough time to head out and find a way to kill the Kracken – the giant monster that’s going to destroy the city. He fights all manner of creatures and beasts and then has to make it back in time to fight the Kracken.

Now I’m going to go off, but I’ll keep it to a minimum if possible.

I hated 87% of the computer imaging in this movie. There were a handful of scenes that I thought were well done. But for the most part, I was either seriously annoyed or flat out enraged. Medusa, the gorgon with snake hair, was entirely made by the computer and 100% not believable, especially her asinine facial expressions. In fact, less believable then the stop action version in the original movie. Stupid. The Kracken itself was large enough that they could take some liberties, but at least THAT creature was believable. Not so much with the flying horses – complete shite. Dessert Scorpions? Ridiculous and campy when the dessert people ride them across the dessert.

The costume on Zeus was probably one of the worst parts. His beard looked like they spirit gummed yarn to his face. Couldn’t they have CGI’d a better beard on Liam Neeson? And I’m going to say something here that might ruin Liam Neeson for the rest of your life. I get Liam Neeson and Ed O’Neil mixed up all the time. This movie I think made it worse since Neeson was so unbelievable. So now, you’ll be picturing Al Bunde every time you see Neeson now – mission accomplished. Additionally, all of the bad guy creatures had a similar look to them – they all looked like their face was pulled down over their missing eyes. I’m not sure if the monster people just ran out of ideas and just went with something they were confident with or what, but they could have mixed it up a bit. Or heck, for that matter, make up some stupid crap and throw it in a computer and make it less believable.

They gave a shot out to Bubo, the brass owl in the original, but then put him back in a box and didn’t utilize him in his crucial role he had in the original. However, they made up for it by having a smoking hot Gemma Arterton playing Io. Yes, her hair style, make up, and clothing changed from scene to scene, but that didn’t hurt her at all. I’m a fan. SO much of the acting was community theater-level or worse that I couldn’t get past a lot of it. Just didn’t buy the facial expressions of the fighters nor the delivery of lines. (Keep in mind, I love B-movies and don’t expect all that much from actors – that’s how bad this was.)

To sum this film up – I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone. Go see the original, even with the stop-action effects they have. I think you’ll be less angry this way. I know I am. I even waited until the end of the credits to find out who did all the awful CGI in the film. However, there were like 5 CGI production companies, so I don’t even know who to be angry with. This movie was a complete waste of time and money in my opinion.